6 Ways to Prevent Neurodegeneration with Dr. Reed Jarvis

Welcome back to another episode of the Real Health Podcast. My name is Dr. Reed, and I'm gonna be continuing our series this week on brain month. As we continue brain health month, today's episode is focused on a topic that impacts millions of people every single year, but it's rarely discussed in a preventative way. We're talking about neurodegeneration. We're gonna go over what it is, what causes it, and more importantly, what you can do right now to protect your brain and slow this process down.

Before we get started, I want to personally invite you to our free brain master class. It's happening April 29th at 6:30om eastern on Zoom. This is a deeper dive into everything we've been talking about this month and everything we talk about today. We're gonna be giving you clear strategies to improve cognitive function, reduce brain inflammation, and also take control over your neurological health. So you can register through the link in our Instagram bio.

And even if you're not able to be there, go ahead and sign up because we will send you the recording once the webinar is over. Alright. So let's get into it. Starting off, let's go over what is neurodegeneration. Let's break it down.

Neurodegeneration means the gradual breakdown or a loss of function in your brain and nervous system cells or your neurons. So over time, this breakdown can lead to conditions like Alzheimer's, Lewy body dementia, Parkinson's, and all of these look a little bit different on the outside, but they all have one thing in common. They are all the result of brain inflammation and cellular damage that has built up over decades. And here's the good news is that these conditions don't just appear overnight. They are the result of decades of dysfunction and inflammation, which means that if you're listening to this podcast right now and you're in your forties, your fifties, even your sixties, we still have time because you can absolutely change the trajectory of your brain health starting right now.

And even if you've already been diagnosed with early stage Alzheimer's, dementia, cognitive decline, if you're starting to experience some of those symptoms, you can still take steps to heal the brain today. Even in our office, we have started to we have seen patients come in in early stages Alzheimer's. And over the course of some of the action actionable tips I'm gonna give you today, they've even been able to improve their brain health before we even started care. So first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna break down what actually drives this process of neurodegeneration. Because like I said before, it doesn't just happen randomly.

So what are the root causes? Number one, we have chronic inflammation. This is the foundation and what every other environmental factor leads to is chronic inflammation and inflammation in the brain. Whether it's triggered by poor gut health, infections, processed food, environmental stressors, ongoing inflammation over time damages your brain neurons, and it causes your brain to decline. Number two, we have toxin accumulation.

In our world, we're constantly exposed to environmental chemicals, mold, heavy metals, plastics every single day. And what happens is these toxins, whenever we get them through the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, these toxins enter our body and they cross what's called the blood brain barrier, and it eventually leads to oxidative stress and the production of free radicals. So number two, we have toxin accumulation. Number three, we have insulin resistance. Alzheimer's recently has been also referred to as type three diabetes.

So what does that mean? It means that when your body is unable to regulate glucose, you have poor glucose regulation, you have imbalanced blood sugar, you have constant blood sugar spikes, what happens is this elevated blood sugar and these insulin levels reduce your brain fuel efficiency, and it drives systemic inflammation. So if we are not able to regulate our blood sugar properly, we end up getting what's called type three diabetes or Alzheimer or just, brain, neurodegeneration. And the next one is methylation dysfunction. And I know we have discussed this in our previous podcast whenever we're going over ADD, ADHD, autism.

Methylation is a process that your brain uses to detox. It's what your brain uses to produce neurotransmitters and repair damaged DNA. And if you have a genetic variant like the MTHFR gene, your ability to methylate vitamins and therefore detox the brain may be impaired. Number five, low antioxidant status in the brain. The brain is highly vulnerable to oxidative stress and low levels of glutathione, CoQ10, vitamin c means that your brain has reduced protection against cell damage and oxidative stress and free radicals that might form in the brain.

So low levels of glutathione, CoQ10, and vitamin c are all risk factors of neurodegeneration. And finally, number six is nutrient deficiencies. Because a healthy brain function requires DHA, omega three fats, b six, b 12, folate, b nine, magnesium. Magnesium is great because it helps regulate the nervous system and antioxidants, as I mentioned before, the glutathione, because these are important for neutralizing those free radicals. And without these the without these essential nutrients, your brain is left unfueled and it's left unprotected.

It's not able to combat that, inflammation and that oxidative stress. So what does this look like for you? If you're listening to this podcast today and you're wondering what are some early signs of neurodegeneration. Because like we said, it is a gradual it's a gradual decline. So what are some early signs, and what does this look like before you even have a diagnosis?

So some common early signs of neurodegeneration includes persistent brain fog, slower recall, memory lapses, poor focus, poor decision making, mood changes, anxiety, depression, difficulty with sleep, unable to regulate your energy. You're constantly feeling tired. All of these are common early warning signs and are, indicative that it's it's important to start taking the steps now to heal the brain. Because even though these these symptoms in our world, especially, they may seem common, just because they're common does not mean they are normal. So if you're having brain fog, slower recall, poor focus, poor sleep, unable to get to sleep, unable to stay in deep sleep, all of these are warning slides.

Your brain is telling you, like, it's important to start taking steps and start healing this brain. And here are some common triggers that worsen the progression of that neurodegeneration and that cognitive decline. You have chronic stress, elevated cortisol levels. You're constantly in that sympathetic state. In our office, we always talk about how your nervous system has two different states, the sympathetic state and the parasympathetic state.

If we take your HRV and you're in a chronic sympathetic state, you're chronically under stress, that is a risk factor or a trigger that can lead to that neurodegeneration. Next, we have poor sleep, particularly a lack of deep sleep and REM sleep. So we wanna be able to get those good REM cycles and get into a nice, deep, peaceful, and restful sleep. Another trigger is EMF exposure, especially at night. We discussed this in the last podcast.

Leaving your phone, by your bed at night, can cause excess EMF exposure. So it's important to minimize our EMF exposure because that is another trigger of causing chronic brain inflammation. And the last one is sedentary lifestyle. Living a sedentary life or not being active can lead to poor circulation, and it can also lead to reduced brain activation. And over time, these factors what's happening is these factors are compounding on top of one another, and they're driving that process of cognitive decline.

So it's not just one thing that's gonna lead to this neurodegeneration. What's happening is these is each of these little things that over time, they build onto each other kinda like a snowball effect and eventually causes our brain to not be able to heal and regulate itself properly. Now if you're working with a provider or if you come into our office, and and we're helping you with your case, and if you're just wanting to look to identify your risk earlier and you're wanting to see, you know, do I have a risk of developing Alzheimer's dementia? Here are several key labs to consider and and labs that we will run so that we can identify your risk. One lab that we run in our office, it's called Alzheimer's LINX, L I N X.

It's from Cyrex Labs. This lab, what it does, it's especially important to run if Alzheimer's and dementia, if it runs in your family, this is a great lab for us to run because it looks at all of the Alzheimer risk that you, that you might have and it determines your susceptibility to developing Alzheimer's. And what this does is it allows us to see what risk factors you have present in your body so that we're able to have a more targeted and proactive intervention for you. Another great lab marker to run is an MTHFR genetic test because that will help us understand your capacity and your ability for methylation and detox. And if you do have poor methylation or you do not have that MTHFR gene, then what we might need to start doing is incorporating some methylated b vitamins.

The next thing we wanna do is look at your homocysteine levels because elevated levels of homocysteine are associated with both cardiovascular and cognitive decline. So we wanna look at those levels and see where they're at in you currently. The next one we wanna do is look at your vitamin d levels because vitamin d is essential for neurological health and immune function. And finally, the last one we wanna look back goes back to the type three diabetes and not being able to regulate blood sugar. We wanna check your fasting insulin and your A1C and your CRP because all of these are going to reflect your metabolic health, your ability to regulate blood sugar, and it's also going to look at your systemic inflammation.

And having this data, like I mentioned before, allows us to have a targeted intervention for you specifically. So now that we have went over and talked about what neurodegeneration is, what causes neurodegeneration, how do we discover if we are susceptible to dementia, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, Lewy body dementia, now I'm gonna give you six strategies that you can start today to prevent neurodegeneration. So here's six steps that can make a significant difference in protecting your brain health long term. Number one, I know we say this all the time, but we want to optimize the gut. We wanna start with the gut.

We wanna optimize the gut brain axis, and this is because the gut and the brain are deeply connected. When the gut becomes inflamed or permeable, it triggers inflammation in the brain. So what do we wanna do? We wanna focus on whole, unprocessed foods. We wanna add fermented foods and prebiotics, and we wanna address any gut dysbiosis or any bad bacteria microbiome in the gut or leaky gut issues.

So we wanna be eating kefir, kimchi, onions, garlic. All of this is great to help rebuild that gut microbiome because a healthy gut is foundational for a healthy brain. Number two, we wanna nourish the brain with functional foods. We want to remove common irritants such as sugar, seed oils, gluten, dairy, and instead, we wanna prioritize wild caught fish, olive oil, avocado, cruciferous vegetables, leafy greens, berries, and herbs like turmeric and rosemary. And if you kinda want more information about, like, what food should I be eating, we have an autoimmune paleo guide on our website, realhealthco.com/resources, the resources tie tab.

It's our AIP diet guide, and it'll walk through what foods are anti inflammatory and what foods are whole unprocessed foods, and that will help improve your brain health. We also wanna support methylation with methylated b complex vitamins and also consider antioxidants like glutathione or CoQ10. All of that is how we nurse the brain and help our brain heal and recover. The third step, incorporate chiropractic care. Chiropractic care is so important for nervous system health and nervous system regulation.

Your nervous system is the communication highway between your brain and the rest of your body. Chiropractic adjustments help reduce stress on your nervous system by clearing out subluxations, and they support the parasympathetic tone of your nervous system. Chiropractic adjustments can also improve your sleep, your cognitive clarity, and it also improves your brain body connection. And this is especially relevant when addressing brain inflammation. Your brain is overworked and autonomic imbalance.

Chiropractic care can help improve your nervous system function and autonomic balance. Number four, we want to move with intention every single day. Exercise increases your BDNF or your brain derived neurotrophic factor, which helps generate new new neurons and protect existing ones. So exercise is stimulating that brain growth factor, and it's helping you build new neural connections, and it's also protecting the neural connections that you already have. Some recommendations for you is walk 10,000 steps a day.

That should be your goal. Let's aim to get 10,000 steps per day. Let's try to resist try resistance training two to three times per week and one to two times. Let's do a cardio low intensity steady state or high intensity interval training. Let's work on some mobility, some balance work.

All that matters is movement is key. Even light activity can increase blood flow and detoxification and cognitive function in the brain. And studies show that individuals who have a high mental capacity and a high physical capacity are less likely to experience symptoms of neuro decline. So what does that mean? Individuals who spend time exercising and building that neural connection and learning new motor pathways have less less likely chance to experience symptoms of cognitive decline or neurodegeneration.

So we want to continue moving and continuing exercising as we age. Number five, this kinda ties into the last point. We wanna stay mentally and socially engaged throughout our entire life. Your brain thrives on stimulation and novelty. What that means is your brain loves learning new things.

Your brain loves learning new skills. So do that. Learn new skills. Continue learning. Play an instrument.

Engage in puzzles, draw, paint, whatever you like to do, continue learning how to do new things because your brain thrives on that neurostimulation. Maintain strong social connections with other people because strong social connections also helps build kind of that sense of purpose. And studies have even shown that social isolation alone is one of the strongest predictors of cognitive decline. So staying connected matters more than most people realize, and consistently learning and exercising matters so much when trying to prevent that neurodegeneration. And finally, number six, we wanna prioritize deep restorative sleep.

The brain detoxifies the body during sleep through the glymphatic system. And if you are experiencing poor sleep, what's going to happen is you're gonna those toxins in your brain and in your body are gonna start to build up. So some tips to prioritize deep sleep is we wanna avoid screens at least an hour before bed, and we wanna keep our room cool, dark, and quiet. And what this does is it's gonna help regulate that melatonin production to allow us to get into a deeper sleep and a more restful sleep so that our body is able to recover. You can also use magnesium or melatonin to help you reach that deep restful sleep.

And every night, we wanna be aiming for seven to nine hours of quality sleep with good deep and REM cycles. And a bonus tip for you is we want to reduce that toxin load. So how do we do that? Your environment and the environment around us directly affects our brains. So some practical ways that you can take action to reduce your toxic burden is you can start by filtering your water and your air inside the home.

You can use a reverse osmosis water filter, that's great, or a HEPA air filter. Those are both great for reducing the toxins that build up in the air we breathe and the water we drink. We wanna avoid aluminum based deodorants, nonstick cookware. Like I mentioned before, reduce EMF exposure by keeping your phone out of the bedroom at night. We wanna sweat daily because sweating helps release toxins through our sweat glands.

We can do that through sauna or exercise movement. And finally, we talked about this with kids, but we wanna get outdoors because it's important for kids to get outdoors for their neurodevelopment. But as we age and we get older, we spend a lot of time indoors. So it's even important for us, 30, 40, 50 years old, continue being outdoors. Go outside.

Do grounding. The frequency of the earth helps calm the nervous system, and that natural sunlight will help regulate your circadian rhythm. It'll give you the vitamin d from the sun, and it'll help reduce your stress. So all of these are important to help improve your brain health. And these small changes have a cumulative protective effect on your brain.

So to wrap up, neurodegenerative conditions don't just happen with age. They happen when the body is under constant unmanaged stress over time. The most powerful strategy for you today is prevention, and that starts by addressing the lifestyle, environmental, and metabolic factors that we have covered today. If you found this helpful, join us for our free brain master class on April 29th at 6:30pm eastern. We'll walk you through everything in more in-depth.

It'll be Dr. Barrett and I, and we'll include labs, supplement protocols, and a full neurological support support plan. So register now through the link in our Instagram bio. It's free, and it's something I believe every person should hear. Until next time. Thanks for tuning in to the Real Health Podcast.

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